Museum of Croatian Independence war in Turanj

In the grim and cloudy winter days I occasionally remember the war of the 90s. The shelling, the times without the electricity, listening to the news on the radio in the basement… One of the places mentioned the most was Turanj. Of the same name as the town where I was born in, this other Turanj, was a place that was hit extremely hard…

Positioned at the very dividing line between the city of Karlovac and the occupied regions, the attacks took place almost daily. We sometimes saw images of the destroyed houses in the newspapers or on the TV. The place looked leveled.

Once the entire country was liberated in 1995. it took years to get Turanj to a previous shape. And someone came to an idea to put a Museum of our independence war right there.

The open-air part of the museum

Unfortunately, there are numerous places and towns that would be great spots for such museum as the war hit hard almost all regions of Croatia.

The museum is not finished yet as the main part, the building, is still under construction. The open air part is quite impressive and interesting as it gives a great overview of all the heavy weapons and machinery used. There is also one building that will not be restored just to better illustrate all the intensity of the shelling suffered in Turanj.

The tanks and self-propelled gunsThese survived the warAnti aircraft gun next to amphibious pontoon

Probably the most interesting artifact is the MIG-21 fighter plane.

MIG 21 bis L-17

This Croatian fighter plane was taken down by the Serbian forces during the operation “Bljesak” in 1995 and, still being in good shape, it was put up on this display making it look like it is still flying. Quite cool looking! The museum is on the main road when traveling from Karlovac to Plitvice or further south.

Despite the museum being interesting, it makes me sad. I still remember what all these weapons sound in real life and real situations.

We should all be grateful that it is all behind us and work hard nothing like it ever repeats.